"Spanglish"

None of this seems to have occurred to Brooks. "Spanglish" pretends to take aim at liberal good intentions, but the movie is just as blinkered as what it's supposed to be exposing. The smugness of "Spanglish," the highhandedness passing as concern for characters whose aspirations the movie cannot even imagine, is a great example of why so many people who'd most benefit from liberal social policies hate liberals. Or, as a colleague of mine fumed on our way out of the movie, "This is why the Democrats lost the election."

The villain of the piece is Téa Leoni's Deborah, the woman who hires Flor, even though Flor speaks only Spanish. You can see Deborah priding herself on what a noble act that is. It's typical of the character's self-absorption, which has become even worse since she lost her job and is spending all her time at home. She has no attention or energy left for her husband, John (Adam Sandler), a famous chef. And she has only disapproval for her daughter, Bernice (Sarah Steele, a marvelous young actor who is the only believable human presence in the movie), a great kid with a terrific personality and a killer smile whose plump frame doesn't fit her mother's ideal of slimness. When the family decamps to Malibu for the summer, and Flor and Cristina go along, Deborah takes Cristina under her wing, lavishing presents and attention on her and winning the girl's adulation in return. Cristina is the daughter Deborah wishes she had, and the attention she pays Cristina confirms her view of her own generosity and good-heartedness.

But "Spanglish" seems to have been made by and for the Deborahs of the world. What's offensive about the movie isn't that a white director has made a film about Latino characters. That argument (only women can create women characters, only black people can create black characters, etc.) is a phony one, ignoring that art is created and experienced by the exercise of sympathetic imagination. "Spanglish" is offensive because it turns liberal self-abasement into self-congratulation.

Brooks uses the Deborah character to show that he's aware of how people in his economic class condescend to minorities, how they believe that their money and goodwill can overcome any differences, solve any problem. But the movie is lost in its own fantasy world. When the screwball comedies of the '30s satirized the rich, they never pretended that the opulent lifestyle was familiar to the audience. But Brooks doesn't seem to have any notion that what he's showing us of Deborah and John's lifestyle -- the two cars, the maid, the private school, the parent who can just stay at home if she loses her job -- will be unfamiliar to anyone in the audience, at least to anyone who is white. In "Spanglish," all the affluent people we see are white, and being Latino means you belong to the little folk who haven't lost touch with their roots. Plucky spitfire Flor doesn't need the money from her white employers, or the advantages they give her daughter. She's ... the people!

Next Page: Leoni, a wildly gifted comic actress, is nearly unwatchable

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